The present invention relates to steering an Internet user to given services of a sponsor.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,774,869 (Toader) discloses a method for providing sponsor paid Internet access and simultaneous sponsor promotion. It is based on distribution of floppy disks that contain unique PINs for each user and an Internet access software. The software accesses and handshakes with an Internet Entry Server, which verifies the PIN number and sponsor paid Internet access time. The Internet Entry Server also performs a registration process which includes a number of personal questions and custom data gathering queries tailored by the sponsor and may give the user a mandatory xe2x80x9cguided tourxe2x80x9d of the sponsor""s Internet Home Page where the user is exposed to current products and/or services of the sponsor and can download promotional coupons, product information, etc. The user is then released to browse the Internet and, after the free time is over, user paid refresh options are provided.
The present invention provides an Internet Access Provider (IAP) a simple mechanism to steer users to given Internet services, such as the Web pages, of a sponsor. The mechanism allows the sponsor to grant a dial-in user unlimited access to the Internet after the user has first accessed given Internet services. The invention is thus important for any IAP that wants to receive income from sponsors by steering Internet users to their services. In the ultimate case, the IAP could receive all of its income from sponsors and thus be able to offer the Internet access for free.
The key characteristics of the present invention is that a user is steered to the Internet services of a sponsor based on a sponsor specific called telephone number or a sponsor specific login name.
Unlike in U.S. Pat. No. 5,774,869, an IAP does not need to uniquely identify the users and therefore no user specific PIN numbers nor software are needed. Instead, sponsors can promote their offers by publicly advertising their sponsor specific Internet access telephone numbers or login names.
Also, the user registration process is in the present invention handled by the sponsor""s own computer (usually a Web server) not by the IAP like in U.S. Pat. No. 5,774,869. The present invention thus greatly simplifies the functions of the IAP by making them sponsor independent and minimizes the amount of information that needs to be transfered between the sponsor and the IAP.